


BREATH TAKEN AWAY

by orphan_account



Category: Homestuck, Machine of Death - ed. Bennardo/Malki/North
Genre: Alternate Universe - No Sburb Session, Crossover, Gen, Humanstuck
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2014-01-26
Updated: 2014-01-26
Packaged: 2018-01-10 03:48:01
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,138
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1154494
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>They say there's a machine that can tell you how you're going to die. Sometimes it's vague, sometimes it's cryptic. But it never lies.</p><p>And when a group of four teenagers meeting up for the first time find out about it, you can be sure it'll have a big impact on them all.</p>
            </blockquote>





	BREATH TAKEN AWAY

**Author's Note:**

> If you don't know about the Machine of Death, you can either a) read on, because it gets explained in-story, or b) have it explained to you by T-Rex [here](http://www.qwantz.com/index.php?comic=675).

"Ghost stories!" John exclaimed with a big goofy grin, hugging his sleeping bag around himself.

"Hey, big surprise, mister slimer PJs wants to tell ghost stories," Dave remarked in as coolkiddy a fashion as he could muster.

"Well, don't you? That's what you do at sleepovers!" He was far too excited about this to back down now. The first sleepover the four of them had ever managed to have was probably not turning out objectively well, as sleepovers went, but he was having a great time anyway being with his internet friends at last. In a metaphor his dad would be proud of, ghost stories would be the icing on the cake.

"I'll participate," Rose contributed, "on one condition: that the stories may be about anything supernatural, rather than being limited to ghosts."

This, John was not going to take lying down. Figuratively, that is; sleepovers tend to involve large amounts of lying down. "But then you'll just creep us out with all your freaky eldritch stuff!" The Fluthlu Mythos, he was entirely sure, was significantly less fun than Ghostbusters.

"I've got a tale too, though!" Jade piped up. "There aren't any ghosts, but it's a really spooky tale! And..." she drew out the pause for dramatic effect... "it's based on a true story!"

"I suppose I'll leave Oglogoth the Deep One for another time and regale you with stories of wizardry instead." John seemed willing to accept Rose's difficult compromise.

Playing the nonchalant, stoic type as usual, Dave shrugged. "I guess I can think of something."

John told a story with a plotline that would seem entirely original and unique to people who had never seen Ghostbusters 2. Rose rambled incessantly about the misadventures of Zazzerpan's Complacency, turning out sentence after sentence of purest purple prose. They had to cut her off after a while, or her tales would run over into next week. Dave told a story that he assured everyone was ironic, though John secretly suspected he just couldn't think up a decent story. Hell, it even started with "it was a dark and stormy night"...

... and ended with "and they all died spookily ever after." Dave punctuated this with a ghosty-sounding noise, made with a perfectly straight face. He moved over a bit so the torchlight glinted off his sunglasses. Fuck yes, he was cool.

"Dave, that was the shittiest ghost story I've ever heard," grumbled a disgruntled John.

"Hey, don't hate. Maybe your mortal mind can't comprehend the subtle intricacies of my storytelling."

Rose concurred. "To enjoy his stories is to know the bliss of stupidity in its most concentrated form, undiluted by even the merest trace of intelligence."

"Yeah, you wanna hear another one? Get you on the eightfold path to achieving dumblightenment. Idiocy nirvana."

"I don't even like Smells Like Teen Spirit," John muttered.

Here Jade had to intervene: "If it'll cheer Mister Grumpy up, I've still got my story!"

"Yeah, okay, stop fucking around guys, storytime with Jade." Dave crossed his legs and rested his elbows on his thighs, leaning in to listen.

Revelling in her audience's full attention, the grinning Jade began her performance.

"My grandpa's business empire runs all sorts of things. Olive Garden's run by him, you know!"

Rose shuddered. "Unlimited breadsticks, the scourge of my digestive system many a time." She patted her stomach to illustrate this terrifying tale of her own. "This is the most horrific story yet."

"Shoosh, you!" giggled Jade. "And all the Betty Crocker stuff's his fault, too!"

"Yeah, could he do me a favour and burn that stuff, please? Then my dad might have to feed me ACTUAL FOOD!" Obviously this story was doing nothing to offset John's grumpiness so far.

"Heh, I'll ask him," she chuckled. "But don't count on it! Now as well as all that, he owns a load of scientific research companies. Lots of pharmaceutical companies, and some other chemical research stuff too. He even helps fund the Large Hadron Collider!"

Raising an eyebrow, Dave remarked: "So if the world blows up, we know who to blame?"

"Yes, if we had the capability of blaming anyone in our undoutedly pulverised states after such an explosion," Rose added.

"It's not going to blow up, it's perfectly safe! Grandpa even showed me the safeguards himself! Anyway, that's not what my story's about. Really, I've just scratched the surface there. There's a lot of stuff being done by those companies that they keep under wraps... and with good reason!"

Rose let out a derisive laugh. Frequenting online conspiracy theories meant she heard this and the like all the time: "Don't tell me, they're researching lycanthropy." 

"Haha, no! That'd be cool, though. But this is nothing like anything from myths or legends. This is completely new, completely unheard of ever before!"

Jade leant in close to all three of them, as if conspiring with them to blow up the Houses of Parliament. "They say... they've got a machine that can tell you how you die."

Silence. She'd got them now.

Mischevious, she continued: "It's simple. You slide your finger into the thing, it jabs you with a needle and takes a sample of your blood, then it prints out a piece of paper with your cause of death on it. Nothing else. But the thing is... it's _always_ true. It's never lied. Not once."

Dave sat up abruptly. "Nah. Bullshit."

On the other hand, Rose hadn't actually heard this one before. Intrigued, she inquired: "Have you tried it yourself?"

Jade shook her head. "No. I've only heard rumours. But some of those rumours say that..." There was a devious edge to her voice. "The place where they've got it isn't very far from here."

It took a few seconds for them to all realise the implications there.

"Fuck no. I'm going to sleep. Goodnight." Dave thumped back onto the floor, hiding in the depths of his sleeping bag.

Rose tutted. "Where's your curiosity, your adventurous streak?"

"Gone to sleep. Like I will be soon. So shut up about this fucking stupid idea and let me get some shuteye," came Dave's muffled voice from within the warmth of the bag.

She gasped, one part melodrama and all parts incinserity. "Oh, dear Strider, I thought you relished any opportunity for grasping further stupidity! What happened to you striving for dumblightenment?"

"Okay, shut up now, or my paper'll say 'sleep deprivation'."

"You wanna check?" Dave could sense John's goofy-toothed grin even from the confines of his sleeping bag.

Exasperated (but still attempting to not let it show -- and in vain), he poked a hole in the bag's entrance and conceded: "Fine, I will go with you on your fucking death machine trip. Can we not mention this ever again?"

He was regretting this decision even before he got back safely into the fluffy fabric.

**Author's Note:**

> If you didn't know about the Machine of Death prior to reading this fic, then _you've seriously been missing out._
> 
> Seriously, the concept is _awesome_. So much has been done with it in [two short story collections](http://machineofdeath.net/about/books) (that I SERIOUSLY SERIOUSLY WANT, but the [free podcast](http://machineofdeath.net/about/podcast) will have to suffice for now cos I'm poor) and a [card game](http://machineofdeath.net/about/games/gca) (you get to WORK OUT HOW YOU'D KILL PEOPLE!!! >:OOO), and pretty much as soon as I found out about it my brain was already machinating ways to Homestuckify it (because obviously I'm just that far gone Homestuck-wise) that just kept on expanding, though I've managed to curtail my ideas at three chapters because otherwise I'd never get it off the ground. There is so much ground that can be covered with this concept, it's like a writer's personal playground.
> 
> </advertising spot>
> 
> On an entirely unrelated note: happy Australia Day to Australian readers! Even though timezones are weird and it's not actually Australia Day in Australia any more, oops. Anyways: for anyone reading Starsignstuck, Chapter 10 now comes new and improved with a snazzy banner. [Check it out.](http://archiveofourown.org/works/831416/chapters/2246299)


End file.
